The Treasury can't sell gilts during the Olympics because no traders are going to work

The Olympics' reverse Midas touch strikes again.

The Financial Times reports that the Government is suspending its weekly auctions of Treasury gilts for a four-week period between mid-July and mid-August over fears that "too many bond traders will be working from home – or not at all – during the Olympics."

A spokesman for the DMO confirmed that the prospect of so few gilts traders being at their desks with trading screens switched on had caused it to take the unusual step of rescheduling auctions.

Such thin staffing raises the prospect of a "sloppy" auction that could force the Exchequer to pay more to borrow. "Why take operational risk when you don’t have to?" the DMO spokesman said.

The two lines which are expected to be unusable during the Games are the Central and Jubilee lines, which serve Stratford station, the main access for the Olympic stadium. They are also the main routes, respectively, to Bank and Canary Wharf stations, the two with the highest concentration of bankers. Worse, many stations used in commutes to those destinations are also expected to be affected. London Bridge station, an interchange between many commuter rail lines and the Jubilee, is expected to be "exceptionally busy" between 7 and 9:30 in the morning and 4 and 10:30 at night. Bond Street, as an interchange between the two key lines, carries warnings that it may take up to an hour to get from street level to the platforms.

Cohen adds:

The absence of new gilts auctions may have a serious knock-on effect, economists said. If, as expected, the Bank of England gives the go-ahead this week for another round of gilts purchases to help boost the economy, it may have to slow these down because of the Olympic effect.

Buying gilts in a market where no new securities are being issued could distort interest rates in unpredictable ways, economists warned.